I was prepared for betrayal, hostility after office but people showed me love, stood by me – Ajimobi’s widow
Mrs Florence Ajimobi, wife of the late former Oyo State Governor, Abiola Ajimobi, has revealed that though she prepared for betrayals from people who worked with her while in office for eight years, she has experienced the opposite.
She stated this while breaking fast with the leaders of Oyo State Council of the Nigerian Union of Journalists (NUJ), in Ibadan.
Mrs Ajimobi also commended her husband, saying playing a man’s role is a heavy task
Her words: ““Thank you for showing me love. When you leave office, it is a mixed feeling. Like I tell people, I was really prepared [for life outside office]. But I didn’t get what I prepared for. I got otherwise. I was prepared for a lot of betrayal and hostility. But I didn’t get it. I am saying this with all sense of sincerity. Every time I went out, I got recognition. I felt love from people. People are still standing by my side. I thank God for that. I was not a perfect person [while in government]. There is no perfect person,I had my faults. We all have our faults; Whatever mine were, they were faults from the head and not from the heart.
“I pray God will answer our prayers, particularly in this season of Ramadan, and protect us. We are in a world that nobody is sure of at this time. But with God on our side, He will protect each and every one of us. Whatever evil is happening around in the world today, we will not partake out of it.
“Listening to the NUJ chairman about immortalising my husband at the NUJ, it is something I would love to do. We will look into it. Right now, we are doing a project in his honour at the University of Ibadan. Hopefully when we finish that, we will come to NUJ. Anything to immortalise my husband and uphold his legacy, you can always count on me. Forever I will celebrate him. Forever, I will uphold his legacy. I think that is why I am still here.
“For NAWOJ, whatever I can do to support the women, I will do it. That is my passion; that is my own calling. I would always support widows, junior and senior ‘colleagues’ because I am part of them and I know how it feels, whether emotionally or financially. It is not easy. I tell people. It is not easy. I respect and love my husband even more in death. I didn’t know so many things he was doing. But now that I am the breadwinner, I just marvel and I wonder how he was coping without complaining. I still said it to my children that their daddy was a great man. I think I love him more in death. He never complained. It’s not one year [after his death] and I am complaining to my children, complaining in my house. This is somebody I lived with him for 40 years and I never for once heard him complain. He was carrying all the load with ease and I said it is not easy to be a man. If there is reincarnation, I don’t want to be a man. I would always want to be a woman and I would always be married to him for as many times as we come back together because he was one in a lifetime, an amazing man. He had a good heart. Yes, he was not perfect, he had his faults. But with all sense of sincerity, he was a good man. He will forever live in my heart,I would forever uphold anything he believed in. And NUJ is one of those institutions I know he believed in. So, in my own little way, you can always count on my support and also to NAWOJ.”
